Welcome to this week’s round-up. This week we take a look at how journaling in the morning can make you more productive, happy and healthy, there are lots of sets of 15’s this week in terms of tips, videos and books, why small-talk is so important and how you can use it to improve your relationship with others, and why tracking your time is beneficial (and how it doesn’t have to be a drag).

We’ve written in the past past about the importance of a great morning routine and there is a technique that is becoming a cornerstone of successful people’s morning routine and that’s a “Morning Journal”. I have to admit I have purchase one but not taken it out of the packaging yet as I’ve still to reach a level of routine that allows me the time to journal in the morning. If you do have the time but aren’t sure what it will do for you, or what all the fuss is about then check out the Morning Sidekick Journal – you can download their first chapter for free so you know what you are getting yourself in to!

I’ve just got access to the new calendar interface and whilst there may not seem to be a massive amount of difference the layout makes your appointments a lot more readable. There’s also some additional functionality that this article from Zapier covers in depth.

Are you stuck in a creative rut? Looking for a bit of inspiration to get your creative juices flowing? Perhaps you’re in the middle of NaNoWriMo and need a bit of a time out to see how other people wrote about a situation. If that’s the case then one of these 15 books is bound to help you get your motivation back on track and allow you to put pen to paper (or brush to canvas, or fingers to keys!)

You might think that technology that helps your health is limited to the Fitness tracker you wear on your wrist but it’s now going much further than that. Your doctor may use Virtual Reality to train or you may be able to use it to get a completely immersive exercise experience that really challenges you.

We’ve written in the past about how to avoid living paycheck to paycheck and our article covered 5 tips to bring in extra cash to help you bolster your finances. This article from Credit Loan takes a look at the root causes of your overspending, how you can set up a workable budget and increase your savings. So now you have no excuse for putting money away for that new laptop or a deposit for a holiday – and you can download my penny saver chart here if you want to get saving in the New Year.

I’ve mentioned Timecamp in the past and they recently reached out to me to let me know they have a blog that covers great productivity hints and tips, and covers some great project management tips too. I’ve been tracking my time with TimeCamp for quite a while now and I love the overview it gives me as well as a weekly email so I can see whether I have been more productive than last week or not (this week I have – by 8%!) If you’re not sure whether you need to track your time, or if you’re not sure whether it will give you any great insights then this article should explain the benefits for you. If you’re looking to take part in the Become An Email Ninja Course and would like to set a benchmark figure of how long you’re currently taking to process your emails I’d highly recommend timecamp as the desktop app can track usage in the background in case you forget to start the timer!

Depending on what day of the week it is, and what newspaper you’re reading, 5 portions of fruit and veg a day is fine. Some other places say you need 7 portions, some say 10 portions and others say 3! Whatever portion size you accept is right for you, we all know we need to eat vegetables so use these 41 sneaky ways to eat more veggies to get more goodness down you.

Your light reading for this week is all about Fort Knox. Being “Built Like Fort Knox” is a phrase that has entered popular culture thanks to the building’s reputation for being impregnable, but how much more do you know about the famous finacial institution? There’s certainly some interesting facts about this famous American Institution.